As Agence France Presse (AFP) reported, the recently released annual budget report by the government of Singapore indicates that the Southeast Asian country will raise defence spending by 4.3 per cent in 2012. This represents an increase of SGD 504 million* over the 2011 budget and will, thereby, augment the total defence budget to SGD 12.28 billion (USD 9.73 billion). According to the report data cited by AFP, defence expenditures will constitute 24.4 per cent of the Singapore government’s total spending for 2012, making the defence ministry the largest beneficiary of the budget allocation.